30
2008
House Price Searches Soar as Prices Plummet
With the market tailspin continuing, we are seeing some interesting changes in consumer search behavior that point to opportunities for marketers. On the one hand, we are seeing increased interest in homes for sale and foreclosures and for safe investment options. On the other hand we are seeing an increase in searches for credit cards and loan products as the financial crisis spreads.
Investment Opportunities:
US Consumers appear to be looking for opportunities to invest in real estate as prices continue to fall. US Internet searches for “houses for sale” reached their highest point of the past two years, increasing 106% over the past four weeks and are up 67% year on year. Searches for “foreclosure” and “foreclosure listing” are also up. I have been thinking about investing in property for the past 10 years and just today asked my husband if we should start looking. We are obviously not alone! (though we have decided to wait…).
We have also seen an increase in searches for “cd rates” (hat tip to my colleague Chris Hafer for pointing this out to me). Searches for CD Rates are up 29% over the past four weeks. Perhaps as some banks offer more competitive rates, consumers are shopping around.
Bad Time for Borrowers
At the same time, we have seen an increase in searches related to credit cards and loans. For example, share of US Internet searches for “credit cards” are up 107% in the past four week sand up 32% year on year. Searches for “bad credit loan” are up 39% in the past four weeks. Searches for “personal loans” reached a peak not seen since July 2007 and are up 127% year on year.
Financial services firms looking to slow attrition would be wise to look at the investments that are attractive to consumers in these tumultuous times. For example, CDs may at least keep the assets on the books.
This looks quite different than the analysis you did in April, when you used “homes for sale” sted of “houses for sale.”
The last analysis you did showed a steady decline in share of searches from March 2007 to December 2008, while this latest one shows more ups and downs and no obvious trend during that period.
Makes me wonder how useful these search terms are in gauging buyer interest if they are so different, and also if the spike you are now seeing in “houses for sale” also shows up in “homes for sale.”
Matt, Thanks for the comment. Great question and it led me to do a bit of follow up analysis. The volume of US searches for “homes for sale” was much higher than searches for “houses for sale” until quite recently. In fact, last week, searches for “houses for sale” overtook searches for “homes for sale” for the first time. Searches for “houses for sale” were declining steadily (along with searches for “homes for sale”) until February when they started to climb.
I wonder if the news of the financial crisis and media coverage of the housing market has caused a change in the language we use to search for homes (or houses) for sale. I should add that I ran our search term analysis report for both terms to see where consumers go after searching for both homes and houses for sale. The results are very similar. This indicates that the consumer intent for both queries is similar.
Thanks again for the comment – and for keeping me on my toes!
Best, Heather
We have a consistent interest in US real estate from our overseas buyers attracted to the mix of low prices and strong Euro and Pound against the dollar. For those who had a life plan to retire to Florida for example christmas has come early!
I’m curious to know what the top search phrases are for foreclosures. A blog post on this topic would be interesting to see since President Elect Obama has vowed to help the americans losing their homes to foreclosure because of job loss, preditory lending, etc.
Thank you,
Ray Santillan